We Asked Big Brother’s Tully Smyth for a Cheeky, Sneaky Secret — She Delivered

3 years ago

tully smyth big brother behind the scenes secret filming lockdown

If there’s one thing to know about us, it’s that we’re huge Big Brother Australia fans. So, when we had the opportunity to chat with Tully Smyth following her eviction from Big Brother Royalty Vs New Contenders, we got straight to the point, and asked for a secret — something that no one else knows about her time on the show.

“Ooh, a secret!” Tully exclaimed over the phone.

“People don’t realise that we spend a lot of time in lockdown,” she began.

“Before eviction, we’re all kind of banished to the bedroom and we’re not allowed to speak for like, a long time. Sometimes it felt like hours! And if we spoke we got in trouble.”

So why does this happen, you may wonder? Tully filled us in.

“It was basically so that the camera crew could all go and get set up in the eviction room, but they didn’t want to miss any juicy bits, so we were often put in these lockdowns where we couldn’t talk for extended periods of time,” she explained, adding: “It was the most difficult part because we’re all loudmouths in that house, so telling us that we can’t talk, torture!”

Even worse, because these lockdowns happen right before Eviction Ceremonies, that’s exactly when the housemates desperately want to be having all the conversations. If you’re thinking about all the ways you’d try to sneak around this rule, you’re not alone.

“There were so many times where I’d be trying to communicate with my eyes, like sneakily,” Tully said. “If only I knew sign language and someone else knew sign language, that would be a massive help, because that’s the time where you need to be cementing your strategy and making sure everyone’s on the same page.”

But what happens if the housemates do talk while in lockdown? Punishment from Big Brother!

“If we did talk — which we did, because we’re naughty little kids — if we spoke we got in trouble and if we got in trouble one too many times, Big Brother would take away the very limited amount of alcohol we were given after an Eviction Ceremony,” Tully shared, adding that during her sting on the show “he did that more than once”.

“That was our only sense of joy in the week!” she exclaimed. “You know, we only got like, one glass of wine or one seltzer per eviction, but if we spoke during lockdown he would take it away from us, and that was just a shame!”

Having been evicted last night, Tully is of course now free to (responsibly!) enjoy all the wine and seltzer she’d like, which perhaps takes the edge off the fact that the two OG housemates closest to her — ex-boyfriend Anthony Drew and 2013 winner/frenemy Tim Dormer — both voted for her.

In fact, while voting in the Diary Room last night, Tim — never one to turn down a reality TV moment — even made a callback to his iconic “DID YOU GET THAT, TULLY?!” moment from 2013, but it was left unclear whether he did actually vote for her.

“Yeah he did, both Drew and Tim stabbed me in the back!” Tully said, adding that it wasn’t a huge surprise to her.

“It’s sad because Tim’s speech in the Diary Room, that’s hands down the nicest thing he’s ever said about me or to me, and I really wish that it didn’t come with a side of backstabbing,” she said. “It made for a really sweet moment, but he said all of that and then ended with ‘did you get that, Tully?!’ which as you could see, rocked me, in the eviction room, and then he stabbed me in the back, so —”

She trailed off.

“The only people that stayed true to their word were Estelle [Landy] and Gabbie [Keevill], they put their point on Johnson [Ashak],” Tully said. “Reggie [Bird] threw her vote and voted for Drew, knowing full well that that would mean nothing, and Tim and Drew flipped along with the rest of the newbies and voted me.”

Still, when all is said and done, Tully remains “family” with her Big Brother alum, and that includes Tim.

“Tim and I will always be fine,” she said. “You go through stages with family where you argue — you might go a couple of weeks, couple of months without talking.

“You wanna punch him in the face sometimes but at the end of the day, it’s Christmas time and you all come round to mum and dad’s and you share a slice of pavlova.

“We’ll always be family. He annoys the absolute crap out of me, I’m sure he’ll say the same thing, but at the end of the day it’s all love,” she finished.

Big Brother Royalty Vs New Contenders airs Monday – Wednesdays at 7.30pm, only on 7 and 7 Plus.

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